“If it were done when ’tis done, then ’twere well it were done quickly,” spoke Macbeth. At Trent Bridge, the end was indeed swift, the assassination of an Australian team that had arrived full of bluster and proved to be a lot of hot air. Inside four overs, the first wicket had been taken and 20 minutes before even the first drinks break on the third day Nathan Lyon’s stumps were flattened and the match and the Ashes were a done deal. There was no real resistance.
How could there be? Already, an hour before play, the rumours were there that Michael Clarke had taken the equivalent of the bottle of scotch and service revolver and decided that the Kia Oval Test would be his last as an international cricketer. For all the ambiguity that surrounds Clarke, it was hard not to feel sympathy for him in the aftermath of the match – a wonderful batsman and a captain who helped set a benchmark for modern intuitive, aggressive captaincy.
By what would have been lunchtime, the crowd were still milling. They had turned up in force to see a great day for England cricket. The team were given a standing ovation as they came on to the field by all but the blocks of yellow-and-green-clad Australian supporters, who sat frowning with arms folded. But they, too, applauded the England team as they did their lap of honour. And at one o’clock, as the team emerged from the dressing room and gathered on the square, the Red Arrows crackled in over the pavilion, trailing their tricolour smoke as a salute. Around the perimeter, the flag of St George billowed on poles and young girls were handing out cards to spectators so they could collect signatures of the England players as they wandered round. Land of Hope and Glory, sang the crowd, and then Jerusalem as if it were Last Night of the Proms, rather than the Poms.
Hours later, Alastair Cook and his men were still out there signing: the mission statement was to reconnect with the public and they were doing so on and off the field. Better they left the arena before dark, though, because we know what happened at The Oval two years ago.
Earlier, Mark Wood, as infectiously, delightfully mad as a bucket of frogs, fed hay to his imaginary horse and then took it off on a madcap gallop. Wood took the final wicket that won the Ashes when Lyon, the last man, attempted to withdraw his bat but was just too late so that the ball deflected from his inside edge to peg back the middle stump and flatten the leg – a spectacular end.
As the England team gathered in a celebratory huddle and jigged their delight, Lyon remained on one knee in the crease, head bowed and leaning on his bat, as if waiting to be dubbed knight. It was the best part of a minute until he could drag himself to his feet and go to meet his partner at the crease, Adam Voges, who had batted undefeated for a half-century on what had been his home ground for five years and who now had played as well as any Australian managed against the ball that swung and seamed.
Sometimes, it is the small things that matter. With three wickets to take, it would have been the most natural thing to say thanks very much to Ben Stokes and Wood and hand the ball to Stuart Broad and Steve Finn, the two experienced seam bowlers, to administer the coup de grâce. It would have been cruel, though, to wrest the ball from Stokes’s grasp, so magnificently had he swung and controlled it the previous evening (he was to point out that he could always do that but with Jimmy Anderson in the side, rarely got a crack when it did move around). Wood though, was retained ahead of Broad after completing his unfinished over from the night before at the Pavilion End and how shrewd to allow these two young men the chance to bowl the ball that won the Ashes. It was thoughtful and gave the young Wood a memory for a lifetime.
Then it was all over. These last two Test matches have been completed in less than five days in total. The pace of the cricket at times has been bewildering, the draw something from a bygone age. Now England have the opportunity to go to The Oval with the pressure valve released. In their minds they will not want to give any quarter to Australia, for they have never won more than three Tests in a home Ashes series. But there is the chance as well to produce something spectacular in celebration. The game may be what the Australians have been fond of calling a dead rubber, but it might be time to fasten the seatbelts. We could be in for a real ride.
